Fear of Video

Today’s Post by Mark Toal

I think a lot of people share my hesitation about shooting video. When I bring it up at talks I do a camera clubs and in camera stores a very small percentage of photographers shoot any video at all, even though it’s built into every modern digital camera.

When I ask why photographers don’t like to shoot video the answers vary from not knowing what to make a video of to a lack of desire to learn video editing software.

I realized that these are the same things that keep me from shooting video. In the past few years I’ve have posted 123 videos on my Vimeo.com account and I’m still not comfortable shooting video. I find that I always fall back on still photography because that’s where I’m comfortable and know what I’m doing.

I’ve written several blogs in the past where I have tried a technique like shooting black and white or in the square format for a week of two at a time. I’ve always come away from those exercises with a new tool to use in my photography when the scene calls for it.

I was recently contacted to photograph the building of a Rat Rod car and I immediately thought of shooting stills like I did last year. Instead I’m going to make a video of the 30-day event. I started last Thursday and I have to admit I want to go back to shooting stills already. I am way out of my comfort zone and feel like a failure.

I’ll share what I learn as we go along and promise to show you the video no matter what it looks like.